Transfer Rumours transfer thread fact and fiction

I agree there's definitely positions that have to take priority but the **** up of 18/19 is still having it's effects on today's team because we're forever playing catchup with improving the squad. At some point I feel we've gotta 'go for it' and attempt an overhaul, that's always risky as we saw with the "Magnificent 7" but there's just so much **** at this club that persisting with it for longer will only see us worse off. The reality is as well that we can sell up to about 8+ players this window and only three positions in the XI would need sorting immediately (RB, DM and possibly a CAM or another CM depending on Ndombele), then the squad player additions wouldn't have the pressure of immediately setting the world alight as they'd have Europa and minutes of the bench to get bedded in. It's all wishful thinking, I know that but I'm just tired of so many players at this football club.

 

The thing with a system is you don't change half of it overnight, instead you adjust and upgrade specific components so that you have both improvement yet continuity. For example, Chadli was very useful at sneaking in at the far post and tucking away chances but would often be anonymous in games before then, so we bought Son to adjust that one component and it led to a major improvement overall

This is why our priorities have to be a DM and a disciplined RB, as those will fix the two faultiest components and, as a result, improve the team around them

 

Problem with him is that he needs about ten crossing opportunities to hit one good cross. So many times he fails to beat the first man. If we're gonna persist with this style of FB tactic (which I personally don't like) we need someone with a better end product. Not sure who that can definitely be, I think Aarons can become a great RB but right now I doubt he'd be a massive upgrade on Aurier instantly, and so it's trying to find someone who can bomb forward and actually hit a decent cross more often than not.

 

true about the crossing frequency....low hard crosses bouncing off the first man. I can recall the odd peach of a cross from him though with curve and height but the mixture just isn’t frequent enough.

I don’t even know what Aaron’s outstanding quality is...does he read the game well like Wan Bissaka? Does he have good attacking ability like the Pool fullbacks? Or is it just pace?

 

The system won't be changed by binning off a lot of the deadwood though and the prioritised signings will remain the same. If we can bin Lucas and/ or Lamela then it frees space for someone like Fraser and/ or another winger.

KWP, Foyth, CCV, Rose, Winks, Dele, Lucas and Lamela could all be sold for instance.
RB, DM, ST, CM/ CAM and one or two wingers would be needed. The first three of those is what we need right now anyway, the rest is then dependent on who goes.

For what it's worth I'm aware that what I want very much likely won't happen as that level of change just doesn't happen often, especially here, I just think it's what needs to happen because there are so many weighing us down. It's painful looking at Spurs now and looking at us from 2016-early 2018.

 

Yeah I think he's a terrible crosser but naturally by the law of averages one of his crosses has to eventually hit the target.

Aarons I'd say is like how Walker was when we signed him - has the raw pace. He's someone that needs a lot of polishing but I think he can be moulded into a top FB in time. I guess the question Spurs need to ask is if we have that time right now or not. Problem though is that there really doesn't seem to be too many top FBs in the market at the moment, those that are great are already at the clubs we can't attract them from. So it's going to need us to either take the time with someone like Aarons or the punt on someone like Castagne.

 

I hear you mate. It’s just the worst possible time to have to do this kind of rebuild.

Improving while you’re ahead is a valuable mantra and to me it’s frustrating that we did this with the infrastructure of the club but not the squad. I do understand financial considerations but it makes you wonder what could have been.

 

Don't... Just don't, lol. Sometimes I kind of wish I could forget that great 2017 season because we were literally right there.

Hugo
Walker, Toby, Jan, Rose
Wanyama, Dembele
Son, Eriksen, Dele
Kane

What an XI that was. One or two better squad players could've made the whole difference that season, Son/ Dier were in and out depending on if we played 5 or 4 at the back but Chelsea had that bit of extra quality to call upon in all areas that made the real difference.

 

He is not only a terrible crosser, he also fails to try and cross when in position.

 

Aarons is my first choice because even if he doesn’t work out, you can offload him to an English side like Saints or Everton for big money

 

you also had trippier, davies and sissoko to call upon.

For us we pretty much used hardly anyone but had willian and fabregas to call upon. I think a big difference was we weren't in europe that season

 

Selling isn't important: buying is

Also, what you're suggesting involves changing the following components of the team: RB, LB, one of CM or AM and RW - that's a minimum four out of ten outfield positions, and considering we're trying to get some of the players bought last summer settled a year later in Sessegnon and Ndombele that is definitely expecting far too much to fall into place considering who we are

For an example of what expecting to bed in too many players at once looks like, look at what happened to Fulham in their last top flight stint: they were trying to bed in Seri, Mawson, Chambers, Anguissa, Schurrle, Le Marchand, Rico and Fosu Mensah - or to put it another way, a new back four, a new central midfield and a new goalkeeper - and it fell apart remarkably fast. Or to put it another way, of the team that got them promoted the previous season, only Mitrovic, Sessegnon, Cairney, Ream and Odoi got regular minutes while a fair number of the squad that got them up were either sold, loaned out, or in the case of Ryan Fredericks left when their contracts expired

 

Yeah that's true, not being in Europe would've definitely helped on the fatigue side of things.

Willian and Fabregas are two elite players to call upon though. I think another advantage you guys had was experience too; Terry, Cahill, Willian, Matic, Hazard etc had won the league with you guys before and that's generally something that helps teams over the line when the pressure's on. It's no secret we've struggled when the pressure's been on in the past, just look up Spursy in the dictionary, lol.

In that summer we only had one successful signing too with Wanyama. Sissoko, Nkoudou and Janssen were dog ****. Had we done better in the market, especially with the striker option I think we *may* have done a bit better. When Kane missed about 5 or 6 games we messed up in matches that on paper we should've won and that was where we 'lost' the title when looking back at the end of the season.

 

Honestly, five points from our first three games - which was due to Dembele being suspended for all three of them (thanks a bunch, Clusterfuck...) - is what affected us, for the simple reason that converting one of those draws into a win would have meant that when we beat The Sheikh Mansour Team in Week 7 we would have gone top of the table, and while there's no doubt the pundits would have begun their sneering campaign asking how long we'd stay there the point is that we would have actually topped the table, something we never actually managed to do under Poch at any point, and that would've given the players a little extra focus considering the previous season

 

They're intertwined because we're likely going to need to sell in order to buy.

I'm suggesting we need two signings - RB and DM - the third is dependent on Ndombele's future. If he goes then we can replace with either a CM or CAM, if he stays then he needs to play to begin paying back his fee. RW - Bergwijn. LB - Davies, although I want the tactics changed on FBs, either have two that'll sit back or two that'll take turns going forward, I just don't like the one forward one back style. Basically I prefer Poch's/ Harry's style of play for FBs than Jose's at the moment, even if I can appreciate the defensive benefits of Jose's.

I wouldn't want a first XI overhaul like Fulham's, we've all seen how that panned out with the Bale 7. Though bedding in 2, possibly 3 players into an XI should be pretty standard with the right signings - and that's a key point too, we've gotta get it right this time around, we've been getting far too many misses than hits in recent years.

 

Yeah that weren't ideal, I just checked as well and when Kane was injured, we drew three straight games against WBA, Bournemouth and Leicester, realistically we should be getting at least 7 points out of 9 - and it was 7 points we finished behind Chelsea. We had the superior GD too.

 

The thing with the asymmetrical FB system that both Poch and the ubermensch used is that the attacking FB requires discipline so they don't end up exposing our right flank and/or central midfield, which was where the system kept failing due to Aurier being ill-disciplined going forward while Rose couldn't be arsed to defend, so in theory we should be looking at an attacking FB on each side...although Sessegnon reportedly working on his defensive game could theoretically kill two birds with one stone, as we'd both gain an attacking LB while also getting Sess a role in the team that's eluded him until now

David Brooks is the name being linked to us that interests me, considering his versatility: he can play CM, AM, RW or LW, and that could make him a very useful addition to the squad, and given he's a threat with his set pieces (and would balance out our HG numbers) he'd certainly fix a few things in the squad, so a Wilson/Brooks double signing might not be the most important thing to consider but it would balance out our squad a hell of a lot

 

Yeah Ally Gold did say on a live chat that his defensive side is being worked on by Jose and co so hopefully in the weeks since the restart plus the upcoming pre-season he should be in a position to actually begin challenging Davies, though I do think he should've gotten on the pitch in some of the recent games, ultimately match time is the only way he'll definitely improve.

I like Brooks, handy player. Missed a lot of this season with an injury but I'd have zero qualms with him and Wilson coming in, we wanted Brooks when he was at Sheffield Utd IIRC.

 

Not a bad idea to be honest. Bournemouth get cash and a player on loan whom we value highly to immediately fill/ part fill the void, we get a good striker who can push Kane.



Though that being said, there is talk of Parrott going on loan to Millwall - worked for Kane.

 

Castagne certainly ticks the boxes for me, as he's used to playing in that role as Atalanta play three at the back and he's got decent end product, and considering Atalanta have scored a whopping 98 goals this season they're clearly not playing catenaccio

Also, if you look at some of their pass maps, you can see that he's not a vortex where possession goes in but never comes out again, which is a huge issue with Aurier